by Paul Carter
Dry lake racing’s origins go back to the ‘hot rodders’ of the 1930s and guys who beefed up their cars to drag-race them, basically anywhere they could. This evolved into competitive drag-racing. In the post-war boom the money racers spent on their cars and motorcycles jumped up and as a result so too did their speed, leaving the Southern Californian Timing Association looking for an official venue big enough to race safely on. This became the first official Speed Week at Bonneville in 1949, but the place was used by racers way before that. The first race that’s remembered involved a car and a train. The train tracks cross Bonneville for more than 200 kilometres, so in 1927 a Salt Lake City local raced his Studebaker against a Union Pacific locomotive. Eight years later the British racer Sir Malcolm Campbell cracked 300 mph on the salt.
That first year of Speed Week must have been amazing, the thin mountain air in Utah’s northwestern corner crackling as the first racers put the hammer down. They just adopted a ‘run-what-you-brung’ philosophy that has now evolved into more than 70 different categories—just for cars, with about the same number again for bikes—and within those classes there are multiple subdivisions broken down through engine capacity, fuel, fuel management, frames, fairings, the list goes on. So you can stand on the salt pan and watch a 60-year-old woman set a land-speed record riding a 1950s Triumph that’s completely clapped out with a top speed of 100 kph, but in that particular class, it’s a new record. Then she can make some minor changes to the bike, re-enter in another class and set another record. It’s progressive and exciting, and soon there will be more: the world’s fastest lawnmower, golf cart, sewing machine, combine harvester—as long as it’s safe and there’s a motor in it, eventually there will be a class that fits the bill in some way, shape or form. So you don’t have to be some minted ultra-slick rocket-car-driving corporate giant, anyone can have a go.
Having said that, however, we didn’t fit in and were in a new no-man’s-land on the salt. We had a motorcycle, but it had a car engine in it, and we were also running our bike on bio-diesel so it fell into more strange uncharted areas as there was only one other diesel motorcycle at the event. No electric motorcycles turned up or other bikes running anything outside the norm in terms of combustion. So according to the rules we were officially ‘unclassified’, neither a car nor a bike, so whatever we did out there would also be unrecognised officially. I’m sure other bikes will be built and one day there will be a class we can fit into.
Rob let out a ‘Woooo!’ as we rounded a corner and got our first glimpse of the salt.
‘Fuck, it’s big,’ he said.
‘Fuck, it’s white,’ said Steve over the radio.
We pulled up at the entrance to the camp. ‘Fuck, it’s hot,’ said Colin as he got out of the air-conditioned Holden. We had a good look around the DLRA camp. It was right next to the salt, so we picked a spot near some trees, rigged up our shade and Rob’s James Bond toilet complete with aircon unit, night light, toilet roll holder and selection of reading material, all of which constituted the same 40 pages of fart jokes, photographs of drunk people vomiting on each other, visual puzzles that involved matching various augmented breasts to their famous owners, with the prize for the lucky winner a motorised esky with flames emblazoned down both sides, and a crossword puzzle Helen Keller could finish. We laid out our swags, disconnected the trailer, and opened the back to check on the bike.
The inside was completely caked in red dust; it looked like a paprika bomb just went off. So we cleaned it up, checked it over and cruised down to the salt for our first look.
GOT SALT?
IT WAS WINDING down for the day. Everyone was off the salt at five and not allowed back on until sun-up, then the tracks opened at seven. The ‘pit lane’ was made up of two rows of team sites, one after another, about 50 metres apart, extending for a few hundred metres. It was a strange sight, these two parallel rows of self-made workshops sitting in the middle of a Dulux-white flat plain that extended into the horizon.
We walked slowly down the lane taking it all in. The rattle of pneumatic tools and laughter from one side mixed with the sudden roar of a big-block V8 firing up on the other side; music bellowed from a old bus converted into a mobile tool shed; a guy wearing only a sombrero, a pair of budgie-smugglers and a high-vis vest scooted past us on a minibike singing a Creedence song. There was an instant sense of community, of comradeship; everyone wandered about like it was a giant family barbecue. Random racers I’d never met before in my life knew who I was and would greet me like an old mate; they knew we had been waiting for three years for this opportunity, just like they had, and made me feel welcome instantly.
Genuine interest and a common goal prevailed as an undercurrent, like an invisible subterranean river running under the salt and permeating through every conversation, every wave and curious nod towards your bike or car or rocket. Not one person was going to walk up to me over the next four days and say, ‘Mate, is that thing diesel?’ They just knew, and their questions were often at a level that only Colin or Ed could answer. Blokes that looked like they literally just got out of prison for eating babies would wander up, crack a massive smile and say something like, ‘Good afternoon, gents, tell me, what’s the in-line velocity resistance like on that super tipex 5000 G-Spot pulse injector modulator in this temperature, cos mine’s running like shit today.’ And I would just go blank.
Everyone knew their stuff, inside out, upside down, back to front, and everyone had an exploded diagram of every part of their machine in their heads at all times. I was lost like a cocktail waitress in a G8 summit and left the pit lane a little in awe. But, as I soon learnt, there’s a very good reason why these people are so tuned up, because if it gets gnarly out there you’re a long way from medical help or a mechanical workshop.
That evening after Rob’s campsite culinary skills produced an excellent dish cleverly called ‘Rob’s Surprise’—an amalgamation of pasta and sauce mixed with several nondescript forms of grey genuine imitation meat substitutes—I grabbed a whiskey and wandered over to the edge of the lake to watch the sun go down. It was so beautiful, a warm kaleidoscope of changing colours sliding across the sheen of the salt as the sun melted into the horizon, it could have been an alien planet, then the stars came out clear and bright. I walked back to our camp, hearing laughter and conversation all around; this was a new sensation, experiencing this blend of awe, excitement and belonging.
I was sitting down on a folding chair, our camp lit by the headlights of Rob’s four-wheel drive, when a filthy bloke in work gear reeking of oil and madness leapt out from the night. My mate Simon Hann had jumped into a site vehicle and driven nonstop from a drilling rig in the middle of Queensland. After the relief of not having crapped ourselves because of his little prank, we were all suitably excited to see him.
Steve had never met Simon so I introduced them as Steve stepped out of Rob’s luxuriously appointed bush shower wrapping a towel round his belly. ‘Where the fuck did you just come from?’ Steve said as he shook Simon’s hand.
‘I just drove down from a drilling location in Queensland,’ Simon explained.
‘Ah, you’re in the drilling game,’ Steve said, nodding to himself in confirmation, ‘I thought I could smell the booze.’
We were soon all settled around our camp under Pajero headlights, talking rubbish and pissing ourselves laughing while working our way through a vintage Macallan liberated from my father’s stash—cheers, Dad.
Monday morning 6 a.m. Rob woke me by undoing the little zippered flap door on my swag and farting through the opening. ‘Rise and shine, speed racer.’ He laughed and staggered over to his bush shower. But I knew he wouldn’t be laughing for long. Last night after we’d finished off ‘Rob’s Surprise’ I got my first go in Rob’s James Bond racing toilet, unfortunately forgetting that there was a series of valves to open and levers to pump prior to leaving the remains of ‘Rob’s Surprise’, so I just left it for Rob, as a surprise. As he entered, you could hear him swe
aring from the pit lane.
Day one for us was the rookie drivers’ meeting; this involved getting the breakdown on pre-qualification to run our vehicle on the main timed track. Speed Week has two tracks: the main timed track and a GPS 3-mile track where you run your machine for the first time on the salt. The GPS track, as the name suggests, is not officially timed; instead they use GPS units to log your speed. It’s also used to qualify for your various licences.
The categories were as follows:
Category E, current and valid state driver’s licence
Category D, 125 to 149 mph
Category C, 150 to 174 mph
Category B, 175 to 199 mph
Category A, 200 to 249 mph
Category AA, 250 to 299 mph
Unlimited, 300 mph and faster.
The record, albeit unofficial, that we were chasing was set in 2007 at Bonneville by a Texan man running a custom-built bike with a BMW 3 Series car engine; he reached 130.614 mph (210.203 kph). So if I was successful in qualifying for my first licence Category D, I’d have the opportunity to break his record.
We towed the trailer down onto the salt and set about rigging up our pit lane digs. Once we got the shade frame up and a large tarp down, we secured everything to the salt with big tech screws and homemade plywood rings like washers, because at night the wind rips across the lake with enough force to blow your entire camp away. The daytime heat is brutal: the average temperature is 50 degrees Celsius, there’s no natural shade or water, and everything is bleached white so the heat is bounced and radiated from above and below. It’s dangerous enough going fast on an uneven unsealed surface; out there it felt like we were doing that on the surface of the sun, and I hadn’t even got my leathers on yet.
The meeting for us rookies was held by a gentleman simply and universally called ‘Animal’, who reared up out of nowhere and grabbed a microphone. The huge crowd instantly fell silent, especially us ‘Salt Virgins’, as Animal cleared his throat. Standing on the step of the DLRA mobile office, he sported shorts, thongs, a high-vis vest and a huge handlebar moustache that almost covered his mouth, basically looking like he would kill anyone who didn’t pay attention. So we all paid attention.
Next was scrutineering or tech inspection, where the DLRA officials make sure that your vehicle is good to go. The rulebook is thick and very detailed so this isn’t a hasty process. I jumped on the bike and rode it over to the three-lane queue forming for inspection. The vehicles that started lining up looked incredible and their noise alone vibrated right through my body: fully retro-styled hotrods, cigar-tube Lakesters with mirror-polished giant wheels jutting out that looked like full-size 1950s toy cars, the full spec Streamliners ready to push 300 mph, a Jaguar E type and an XJS, a 356 Porsche Speedster—there was even an old split-windscreen Volkswagen Kombi in there, and a truck. The bikes were equally diverse and abundant, from a Honda CT 110 postie bike capable of more than 80 mph to vintage to ultramodern, the lot.
I bounced around the three queues talking to everyone and getting their take on racing on the salt, and enjoyed the same mix of smiles and heatstroke. However, the scrutineering gets serious when you consider the speed these people are reaching; it gets even more serious when you see the inside of their vehicles and watch them go through the inspection process.
One by one they demonstrated that they could ‘bail out’, which sounds like they’re going to jump from their vehicles or something but actually means they know how to save themselves. If you’re hurtling across the salt at warp speed and something goes very wrong, you need to have the presence of mind to remove your death grip from the steering wheel, pull the parachute, kill the master switch, activate the fire extinguishers, kill the fuel pump and start the process of egress from your fully armoured driver seat, assuming you’re not upside down or on fire and are still conscious, possibly having just flipped over several thousand times. Getting out is even harder.
You know that old footage of the manned rocket missions into outer space in the 60s and the astronaut with his briefcase air supply is getting helped into his seat, then the German guys in the lab coats pile into the capsule and strap the astronaut in by standing on his groin and shoulders and pulling collectively as hard as they can. Well, these salt lake racing guys are strapped in like that, so they can just breathe, then their entire full-face-helmet-clad head is restrained and strapped into another metal frame, then their arms are tethered with more straps and they’re also wearing fireproof undies, dragster spec fire suit and gloves.
As I stood there I suddenly realised that Speed Week is a serious and extremely dangerous business.
By the time we got to the scrutineering tent I was grinning but completely terrified, I had also managed to cook my brain and was overheating at a frightening rate. The motorcycle scrutineer looked at my riding gear and helmet, then turned to Ed and asked if I’d recently had a stroke. ‘Mate, you need to drink some water and try to relax before your run,’ he said to me.
I nodded but couldn’t talk as I’d run out of spit and my tongue was stuck to the roof of my mouth.
‘The bike’s fine,’ he said and slapped my pass into my hand. ‘Good luck.’
He smiled and moved on to the next bike, while we went back to our pits where I drank 600 litres of water, pulled on my leathers and boots and got in the queue at the back of the GPS track.
Speed Week is all about queuing and patience and drinking 600 litres of water and still not peeing. At the GPS track a truly oddball mix of would-be speed aficionados lined up, sitting around in leathers in 50-degree heat and waiting their go. Mates, wives and family members took it in turns to hold umbrellas over heads while now and again someone would pour water down the back of racing leathers, wet towels abundant. We patiently waited for our turn while Ed ferried water to me. I needed a nappy by the time I was at the pre-start line.
CRAZY
PAVING
FINALLY THE PRE-START line was there in front of me; about 10 metres beyond that lay the start line, a thin length of blue rope stretched across the surface of the salt. This was when I had a few moments to get organised while the rider ahead of me waited for the official starter to give him the nod. I waited with the bike grumbling under me while sweat trickled down under my leathers; helmet on and strapped, engine on, fuel pump, fuel management system, engine kill line tethered to my wrist, GPS, gloves, all on.
Sean Kelly was the man ahead of me. He was poised, focused and ready, and the starter was standing to Sean’s left with a two-way radio pressed against his ear waiting for the spotters down the track to tell him it was all clear. Then Sean rolled forward slightly and collapsed, falling from his bike; the engine died the moment his hand left the grip. The starter rushed in to get his helmet off. Sean was in trouble and was whisked away into the shade, his bike pushed over to one side.
The starter waved me forward. I popped the bike into gear and rolled up to the line and looked down the endless track; the Coriolis effect of the earth came into play here. The lake was so vast, I was suddenly not hot anymore—I was so pumped I nearly puked pure adrenalin into my lid. I broke my stare into the white abyss to look over at the starter; he was talking into the two-way, then he stopped, gave me a big smile. ‘Good to go,’ he shouted over the engine noise. ‘Visor down,’ he motioned like a man finishing a salute and pointed down the track. ‘Go!’
I throttled on slowly and clutched out at the same rate, remembering I had so much more time and space than the blacktop, this was the salt. The bike still slid slightly sideways, fishtailing off the line with wheel spin through first gear. Second stopped the slide and I gained grip and acceleration, slowly climbing through the revs. It’s a bizarre surface to ride on, the whole lake looks like white crazy paving. It’s not a flat smooth surface at all; each piece of the crazy paving is at a slightly different angle from the one it’s attached to, and in between there is a bulbous line of salt that grows out of the cracks like too much mortar between concrete slabs. The track
is about 10 metres wide and visible because the DLRA shave the salt mortar off the surface in the morning by dragging a huge piece of angle iron down the track.
Third gear started the vibrations, to my horror, that increased to a point where I could no longer read my instruments. The boundary between the salt and sky blurred on the horizon as I found fourth gear and tucked in as hard as I could. That morning I lay on the surface near our pits and licked the lake while Simon laughed at me; it tasted like salt, it looked like salt. I rubbed it between my fingers and imagined hitting it at 200 mph with a half-tonne bike on my head. It was tacky to the touch and sticky underfoot, caking onto shoes and tyres. But now in the heat it had dried out and hardened; now it was like a combination of hard damp sand and snow. The 1-mile marker shot past my shoulder out of the blinding white blur, then from nowhere a massive gust of wind hit the bike and shunted it over to the left; adrenalin made me grip harder and heave the bike into the wind, trying to correct my line. Inexperience had me riding down the centre of the track and not prepared for the crosswind at the halfway mark that everyone, even the guy selling meat pies off the back of his ute in the pit lane, knew about, except me.
The unique composition of the salt and the power of the wind combined with the size of my bike meant that although I was leaning as hard as I could into the wind, I was still getting pushed and sliding across the surface closer to the left edge of the track. Straying off the track meant a fall. I backed off the throttle and regained control. Salt lake racing was not at all what I imagined it would be like. I thought it would be easy, you just hold on and go, but it’s not that simple.
My ride down the return track ended at the back of the queue where the DLRA officials retrieved their GPS unit and logged your speed. The official said, ‘94.6 mph,’ and went on to the next vehicle. That’s about 152 kph, well under what I’d achieved on the tar and much less than what we knew the bike was capable of.
